Tweet
So I work for the cable company, in a call center. I actually enjoy what I do quite a bit, but sometimes we get people calling in who's stupidity and/or smugness can make your nose bleed.
The other day a call comes in and I see the address is in a ritzy suburb of town, so I'm gearing myself mentally for an entitled customer. I end up having a curve ball thrown at me.
Let me digress here by explaining a little technical matter: HD channels only are in HD if that's what the program is being broadcast in. Meaning that just having your set on a HD channel doesn't automagically turn whatever you're watching into a HD broadcast if it wasn't originally sent out that way. In fact, out side of prime time hours and sport events, most of your local channels are not being broadcast in HD yet (in most areas).
OK, back to the call. First thing I notice is the accent, I live in an area somewhat known for its local dialect and anyone calling in from another part of the US tends to stand out. Guy says he's from New York (aha!) and that he's at a friend's house trying to watch a show but the picture is not filling up the screen. I tried to explain what I mentioned above about HD stations but was cut off by the guy who informed me that "I've worked for Neilson for over 25 years so I know about TV, so don't try to tell me about it".
First off, working for Neilson means he knows all about TV *ratings*, but (obviously in his case) doesn't mean you know jack poo about TV broadcasts themselves. When I was finally able to finish my statement about HD broadcasts, the guy realized I was right in that "wow, I've just been a tremendous d-bag just now, haven't I?" tone of voice.
Second call:
Phone beeps, caller info pops up. Per my habit I check the account notes while doing my greeting spiel. My co workers are pretty good at (professionally) warning each other about potential nutbag callers so you don't get completely blindsided a lot of the time. Sure enough there were several notes about "customer calling us liars" so I knew business was about to pick up.
She sounded like a sweet enough old lady, and I'm usually pretty good at handling off-the-wall callers so I figure I got this one. She's telling me she's trying to watch the baseball game and that we're trying to take her channels away. She said she's called before and she knows we can take people's channels away and wants me to stop doing it . Ok......... Right about then I'm doing this:
and a little of this 
...........then it dawns on me that what she's describing sounds an awful lot like a closed captioning box that's set to take up nearly half the screen.
So, confident I can be the hero who solves her problem, I attempt to get her to check her TV settings to see what the CC is set on. This ends up launching her full attack, stating it is definately NOT her TV that is the problem, it's us taking her channel away by pressing our buttons and she's going to REPORT US (never said to who) if we didn't stop it. I tried to reason with her, then flat out just asked why would we as a provider of service be taking away channels she's paying for, while assuring her we have no such channel removing button. That's when she started into the "YOU'RE A LIAR, YOU'RE A LIAR" routine and I immediately realized why all the previous notes made a point of mentioning this. She informed me I should be ashamed of myself and ended the call.
At that point, I just stared at the monitor and wondered if I should put a pancake on my head since I had no idea what she was talking about.
The other day a call comes in and I see the address is in a ritzy suburb of town, so I'm gearing myself mentally for an entitled customer. I end up having a curve ball thrown at me.
Let me digress here by explaining a little technical matter: HD channels only are in HD if that's what the program is being broadcast in. Meaning that just having your set on a HD channel doesn't automagically turn whatever you're watching into a HD broadcast if it wasn't originally sent out that way. In fact, out side of prime time hours and sport events, most of your local channels are not being broadcast in HD yet (in most areas).
OK, back to the call. First thing I notice is the accent, I live in an area somewhat known for its local dialect and anyone calling in from another part of the US tends to stand out. Guy says he's from New York (aha!) and that he's at a friend's house trying to watch a show but the picture is not filling up the screen. I tried to explain what I mentioned above about HD stations but was cut off by the guy who informed me that "I've worked for Neilson for over 25 years so I know about TV, so don't try to tell me about it".
First off, working for Neilson means he knows all about TV *ratings*, but (obviously in his case) doesn't mean you know jack poo about TV broadcasts themselves. When I was finally able to finish my statement about HD broadcasts, the guy realized I was right in that "wow, I've just been a tremendous d-bag just now, haven't I?" tone of voice.
Second call:
Phone beeps, caller info pops up. Per my habit I check the account notes while doing my greeting spiel. My co workers are pretty good at (professionally) warning each other about potential nutbag callers so you don't get completely blindsided a lot of the time. Sure enough there were several notes about "customer calling us liars" so I knew business was about to pick up.
She sounded like a sweet enough old lady, and I'm usually pretty good at handling off-the-wall callers so I figure I got this one. She's telling me she's trying to watch the baseball game and that we're trying to take her channels away. She said she's called before and she knows we can take people's channels away and wants me to stop doing it . Ok......... Right about then I'm doing this:
and a little of this ...........then it dawns on me that what she's describing sounds an awful lot like a closed captioning box that's set to take up nearly half the screen. So, confident I can be the hero who solves her problem, I attempt to get her to check her TV settings to see what the CC is set on. This ends up launching her full attack, stating it is definately NOT her TV that is the problem, it's us taking her channel away by pressing our buttons and she's going to REPORT US (never said to who) if we didn't stop it. I tried to reason with her, then flat out just asked why would we as a provider of service be taking away channels she's paying for, while assuring her we have no such channel removing button. That's when she started into the "YOU'RE A LIAR, YOU'RE A LIAR" routine and I immediately realized why all the previous notes made a point of mentioning this. She informed me I should be ashamed of myself and ended the call.
At that point, I just stared at the monitor and wondered if I should put a pancake on my head since I had no idea what she was talking about.
Comment